Friday, April 17, 2015

George Lucas Payback Project

George Lucas

(Marin County, California)

After George Lucas ran into a buzzsaw of opposition from his wealthy Marin County neighbors when he tried to expand his Skywalker Ranch studio, the filmmaker might be getting some payback with plans for one of the largest affordable housing projects in the Bay Area.

Lucas, the Star Wars creator is offering his own property in west Marin County off Lucas Valley Road near Novato for the project, with plans for a community of 224 homes right where neighbors said no to his studio expansion.

“He said ‘we’ve got enough millionaires here. What we need is some houses for regular working people,’” Lucas’ lawyer Gary Giacomini said.

Others[edit]Starting in 1988, Lucasfilm sought approval to develop another nearby property called Grady Ranch at 2400 Lucas Valley Road.[7] The most recent proposals called for a 263,701-square-foot (24,498.6 m2) digital film production center for the property. However, in the wake of delays caused by local resistance and environmental concerns, Lucas abandoned these plans in April 2012 and has instead decided to sell the land.[11][12]

SAN FRANCISCO, July 15 - Daylight streams through the windows of George Lucas's gleaming new $350 million headquarters, situated conveniently - and to some degree, surprisingly - in the middle of the Presidio, a former Army post on the edge of this city, where the public can mingle beside the Yoda fountain with company employees.

For decades Lucasfilm, the director's privately held company, and its two main divisions - LucasArts, the video game producer, and Industrial Light and Magic, a leading designer of movie special effects - were tucked away in barely marked structures in northern San Rafael and behind the impenetrable walls of nearby Skywalker Ranch.www.nytimes.com/2005/07/20/movies/20pres.html